Frank Leonard White was a Trimmer on the Titanic.
Background[]
Frank Leonard White saw the world for the first time on the 22th of November in 1884. His James White was a matelot and brought a new Sotonian to life with his partner Elizabeth Rendell. Southampton was also the place or orgin to the two, who must have stated their vows of loyalty to eachother there as well, in 1882.
Frank was their eldest. Younger siblings followed in the next years, with the pair begetting Rupert James in 1883, engendering William in 1886 and giving life to Bertie John in 1893. Arthur Conrad would be last in line, raised in 1895.
In the meantime, father James roamed the whitecaps so in 1891, he couldn’t be seen too often at his hearthstone, which first belonged to Elizabeth’s elders, Rupert Rendall and his wife Susannah. They had given up on the diggings in 1901 and had flitted to Saint Mary’s, also in Southampton. On the first of December, Frank stepped into a new discipline in his life. With just over 16 Winters of life experience, he admitted himself to the light infantry of the Royal Marine, in the precinct of Portsmouth.
By 1911, James was retired and ensconced in Saint Mary’s, without Frank. Frank must have also found his feet on the billows of the blue expanse, his main endeavour.
Titanic[]
In April 1912, Southampton would meet the most fabulous craft they had ever set eyes on. She was a modern liner that went by the name RMS Titanic. In the hope of making 5 pounds and 10 shillings a month, he submitted for the post of Trimmer. He was matriculated on the 6th of April in Southampton, a while after being let go from the Oceanic. He was 27 years old and had not been spliced to anyone.
Frank checked in with the Engineering Crew on April 10, in Southampton. He was nestled in a small area to the north-east of the town centre. The given adress was the same as the rest of his family in the year before. From berth 44, Ocean Dock, Dock Gate 4, Titanic was manouvred into the first river. Frank’s former employer, the Oceanic, didn’t have enough coal. She was berthed alongside SS New York, a ship from the Inman Line that also lacked coal. This vessel got a bit wild when Titanic was about to pass her, she could only be restrained when closing in so far on Titanic that one could easily to jump from the giant onto the twin-screw ship. Titanic’s suck-zone had caused this effect.
During the voyage, Frank would be in one or more Boiler Rooms, lugging coal around from 8:00 to 12:00 o’clock, in both day-halves. He could rest on the bedrooms on E-Deck, two decks below the Forecastle, tightly packed with 21 other men from his watch.
With the heart stopper at Southampton harbour out of the way, Titanic set course to France. Her last port of call was in Ireland, from where she would cross the Atlantic Ocean to New York. America’s large metropolis was expecting the ‘Queen of the Ocean’ on the 17th.
Something got in the way on the night of April 14. An iceberg had manifested itself on the 14th of April, some miles off the Labrador Current. Titanic was confronted with this mountainous body. It was a chilling day for the occupants since the afternoon and the firmament was rich with stellar objects, apart from the Earth’s natural satellite. This obscured the iceberg in the horizon. At 11:39, the floater had come into sight, but it meant the lookout crew had no second to waste and they let the ship’s bell give off three tocsins, while communicating with the bridge via telephone. Word was received and now the First Officer sprang into action.Titanic needed to be budged into a portside angle and soon enough, the quartermaster at the wheel rotated it. First Officer Murdoch then demanded from the Engine Room that they should get the machines in the opposite direction. When all was set in motion, Titanic’s nose had reached the iceberg and she made a slight kink to the left. Her starboard however was not clear.
Trituration by ice showed to be ineludible. The metal on Titanic’s coating was deformed and molded and water was dripping through the openings, on 6 areas, all bordered on eachother with a thick vertical partittion. Titanic’s captain was soon up and running, headed for the bridge. He formed a plan to see how Titanic’s fortune would play out. How much of a hindrance was it. Later, he wanted advice from the man who had shaped Titanic to his imagination, contriver and mastermind Thomas Andrews.
Thomas Andrews contemplated about Titanic’s jam and looked over her plans as a reference point. Titanic’s exceptional line of defense would prove useless. The dividing walls only stretched as high as D-Deck at best, but most ended at E-Deck. They could simply be overbrimmed. With this projection, he came to Captain Smith at midnight, April 15.
Smith’s guts must have felt like they were punched. He had to see to it that people were put out of danger. Andrews had told him that 2 hours would be available to start an evacuation. The order came at 12:05 A.M. Matlows and other crew had come up to the Boat Deck to set about getting lifeboats lined up to the deck.
When more than 2 hours had passed, 2 lifeboats out of 20 still needed to be heaved down. The clock however didn’t stop ticking, nor did the ship stop sinking. Her pumps had helped gain a few extra minutes, but now the moment was there that the sea mercilessly took a hold on the ship and the boats were cast into the water. Over the course of the next 10 minutes, Titanic’s first funnel, magnificent dome that cast natural light into the First Class Grand Staircase and bridge were all floored and floundered. Her propellers were getting dryer as they were put in an unnatural position: above the waterline. The elevating motion became more fierce as more of the ship became inunduated.
Extreme forces were at play when the mighty vessel was standing out of the water with her back pointing to the sky diagonally, half-filled with water. At a large angle, she hit her breaking point and the stern snapped off from the rest of the ship, which then made its descent down. It took only two minutes for the rest to sink. The break-up had left a crater-like gap. It was all filled rapidly. The posterior was erected once more and twirling around when it surrendered to the water at a plumb level.
Frank White had been working when the shunt had come. Nothing else is to say about his time onboard. He would not get a spot in a lifeboat, as he went to the icey world beneath the waveless brine, wether it ws inside or outside the ship, he perished. Most of the bodies were never to be encountered since, including Frank.
After his death[]
Barely 30 days later, the White household had another soul to bemoarn. It were very tough times for mother Elizabeth White, who was robbed of a son, her husband James and in 1916, Arthur would not come back from his unit in the British Army. He was with the platoon responsible for the big guns, for support fire. He was stationed in Somme, where an exhausting trench battle took place between French and British soldiers against the Germans.
On the 21st of July, 1916 another victim was claimed through the pointless combat. He was Arthur White. Both Titanic and World War One cost Elizabeth two of her off-spring and her beloved partner in just 4 years.
Elizabeth White would not have to endure all of World War Two at least and remained loyal to Southampton as her hometown. The year 1940 was her last.